Our VP of Marketing and VP of Customer Success are locked in a turf war over who owns the customer retention metrics and onboarding communications, leading to duplicate efforts and massive confusion. How do we use the Accountability Chart to resolve this cross-departmental conflict permanently?

Question

Tyler Smith · Accepted Answer

When two leaders fight over who owns a critical function like customer retention, it signals a major structural issue on your Accountability Chart. Overlapping responsibilities breed confusion, duplicate work, and active peer conflict. In EOS®, we design the organization with a simple rule: only one person can own a seat, and every major role must have a single point of accountability.

To resolve this turf war, the Integrator must lead a session to rebuild that section of the Accountability Chart. Do not focus on the personalities involved; focus purely on what the business needs. Map out the specific roles required for customer success and marketing. Clearly define who owns the customer onboarding journey and who owns the retention metrics.

Once the seats and roles are defined, apply the GWC™ filter. Does the VP of Customer Success or the VP of Marketing have the capacity and skill to run this specific function? If both GWC™ the role, the Integrator must make the tough call and assign sole ownership to one leader. The other leader must yield control and support the decision.

Finally, update your weekly scorecard to reflect this change. The leader who owns the seat must own the metrics. By establishing a single point of accountability and measuring performance weekly, you eliminate the ambiguity that fuels turf wars. This clean structural design is essential for building a healthy, functional leadership team that can scale toward a successful exit.